Chapter 2: Perception and Communication

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Chapter 2 Perception and Communication
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Content

• Chapter check
• Meaning
• Human Perception
• Influences on Perception
• Guidelines for enhancing communication competence
• Question to ponder on

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Chapter Check

• Define meaning and perception

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Meaning

• Heart of communication
• Significance we attach to phenomena such as
  words, actions, people, objects and events

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Human Perception

• Active process of selecting, organizing and
  interpreting people, objects, events, situations
  and activities

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Selection

• Factors affecting stimuli
• Some qualities of external phenomena draw
  attention stand out
• Perceptions are influenced by the acuity of our
  senses
• Change or variation compels attention

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Organization

• Organize perceptions that make them perceive
  meaningful to us
• We organize and interpret experience by applying
  cognitive structures called SCHEMATA

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Schemata

• Prototypes
• - knowledge structure that defines the clearest
  or most representative examples of some category
  (ex. Excellent teachers)
• b. Personal Constructs
• - mental yardsticks that allow us to position
  people and situations along bipolar dimensions of
  judgment (Ex. Intelligent not intelligent)

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Schemata

• c. Stereotypes
• - predictive generalizations about people and
  situations
• d. Scripts
• - consists of sequence of activities that define
  what we and others are expected to do in specific
  situations (Ex. Greeting casual acquaintances)

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Interpretation

• Subjective process of explaining perceptions to
  assign meaning to them
• Attributions
• - explanations of why things happen and why
  people act as they do
• Self-serving Bias
• - we tend to construct attributions that serve
  our personal interests

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Influences on Perception

• People have different perceptions
• Physiology
• physiological states influence our perception
  (Ex. Tired, sick)
• Age influences our perception the older we get
  the more complex is our perspective on life and
  people

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Influences on Perception

• Culture
• consists of beliefs, values, understandings,
  practices and ways of interpreting experience
  that are shared by a number of people
• Codes of behavior

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Influences on Perception

• Social roles
• - messages that tell us we are expected to
  fulfill particular roles, affect how we perceive
  and communicate (Ex. Teachers often perceive
  classes in terms of how interested students seem)

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Influences on Perception

• Cognitive Abilities
• - how elaborately we think about situations and
  people, and the extent of our personal knowledge
  of others, affect how we select, organize and
  interpret experience

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Guidelines for Enhancing Communication Competence

• Recognize that all perceptions are subjective
• Avoid mind reading
• Check perceptions with others
• Monitor the self-serving bias
• Distinguish between facts and inference

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Question to ponder on